


Soldier and Librarian

by TulePubPirate



Category: Final Fantasy VIII
Genre: Bookworm Zell, Dorks in Love, F/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-29
Updated: 2014-03-29
Packaged: 2018-01-17 09:51:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1383082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TulePubPirate/pseuds/TulePubPirate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zell has a plan to tackle his upcoming SeeD exams. What he doesn't have a plan for is the butterflies he gets every time a certain librarian looks his way. And when he doesn't have a plan, his mouth tends to babble of its own free will.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Soldier and Librarian

Zell had a few short months until his SeeD field exam. Usually, candidates didn’t know what the exam was going to entail until the day itself arrived, not because Garden liked to _purposely_ keep it secret from the students, but because often the client didn’t want their involvement with Garden plastered where any presumed enemy might see it. The consequences for the students however, were anxious, sleepless nights and weeks of escalating rumors.

But not for Zell. He was going to beat the system.

He’d been keeping up with global news obsessively for the past year, his eyes glued to the television in his room every night as he did homework, every morning as he ate breakfast. He sorted out likely problem spots during his morning jog to campus from his home in Balamb. Being the only student at Balamb Garden who commuted, he usually had the long stretch of road to himself, and the sea breeze whistling through the grass and trees, the open air, the gentle quiet of it all, was the perfect balance of relaxing and boring that his brain needed to run at optimum efficiency. He knew right away that they were going to be contracted against Galbadia in some way. With President-for-Life Vinzer Deling’s recent expansion campaigns, a lot of the smaller nations bordering the goliath were nervous, and for good reason. One of the possible clients, Timber, was currently under Galbadian occupation, and trains into and out of the city were rare as resistance movements forced the foreign army to crack down.

Dollet was another likely client. Rumors that a group of Dollet officials had secretly visited Garden had been circulating for a few weeks, and anyone paying attention knew that a large number of Galbadian soldiers were mobilizing in Timber. Though no one knew exactly what the army was up to, Dollet was the nearest nation, and its capital was a wealthy port city. Their government had already publicly declared the occupation of Timber immoral and “showing a distressing lack of respect for the international community,” so they certainly weren’t what Galbadia would consider friends. 

Now that Zell had narrowed down his suspects for the field exams, he was ready for phase 2: research. According his watch, he'd been in the library, digging through the shelves for books on Dollet and Timber and Galbadia, for an hour and a half, and now he had taken over a table to try and sort through which ones were useful, which he could put back, and out of the useful ones, where to start reading, since he could only check out ten books at a time. He was bit flummoxed about how to start going about sorting everything, and his posture must have given him away, because it wasn’t long before one of the librarians wandered over to see what he was up to. Zell tried—and probably failed—to swallow a smile when he noticed which particular librarian it was.

“A new project, Zell? What are you working on this time?” 

Even though he’d seen her coming from across the room, he still jumped when she spoke, and by the time she was standing next to him, peering curiously at the books sprawled out over the table, he was mortifyingly certain he was blushing.

“Ah, hey Marnie!” He caught himself rubbing that back of his head nervously and forced himself to stop. “I was just working on some research. For the, ah, field exam later this year.” He straightened his spine and pounded a fist on his chest, trying his best to radiate confidence. “Seeds gotta be prepared, you know!”

Marnie’s pigtail bounced as she laughed. “Prepared is right! The SeeD field exam shouldn’t be for at least two months. You really are diligent!” She was so cute he thought he might die. His hands twitched as he fought not to rub them against his pants like an idiot. “But you look like you’re having trouble? Need some help?”

Zell practically fell over himself pulling out a chair for her. “Yes!” Another librarian over at the check-out desk—probably Sonja—glared at his eager shout. He tried so hard to be quiet in here, but loudness was just his nature. “I’m trying to pick out where to start! I’m reading up on Galbadia, Dollet and Timber! I think one of the latter two are going to contract us against the former, so I want to make sure I’m ready to go whichever scenario it turns out to be! And even if the field exam is something completely different, it never hurts to know, right? After all, SeeDs go all over the world, and with all the activity Galbadia’s stirring up, I’ll probably have a few missions over there! I’ve gotta know what I’m getting into!” 

He flinched as his hand slammed down on the table for emphasis, making Sonja chastise him from where she sat—“Zell! This is the library! Control yourself or get out!” Marnie just smiled and started picking up some of the volumes in front of her to read the titles. She never shushed him—she was just about the only person he knew who didn’t. It was like something out of comic book. He thought about sitting down next to her, but shook his head to himself. He’d just immediately spring back to his feet again; he could never sit for long. 

“This one here is a good place to start for Dollet,” Marnie said softly, flipping through a small book Zell vaguely remembered picking out of the history section. “It talks about a lot of the basics of Dollet—the geography, its government, history—without getting bogged down by one subject. You want to start broad, remember, wait to narrow down when you know what you need to narrow down to.” She reached over to pick up a thick volume on Galbadian naval battles lying on the other side of him. “Like this, for example. Later on, when you have stronger base of information, there might be something in this book you’ll need, but it will probably be just one section, not the whole thing. And starting off with this is just too much!” She set it aside with some effort, starting a pile for rejects. 

Zell looked up at the ceiling, running his hand through his hair. “Yeah, I figured. I mostly picked that one up ‘cause it looked interesting.” He laughed, quietly, for once. “I might have gotten a bit carried away.”  
He looked back down at Marnie’s face then, and smiled. She smiled back, broadly, delighted by his love of books, and motioned for him to take the seat next to her.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “There’s plenty of time to read everything, Zell! Come on, now, I’ll help you pick out your ten.” They spend another half an hour going through the pile Zell’d collected, paring it down to nine, and, partly because he felt bad for making so much work, and partly as an excuse to stay longer, Zell helped Marnie and Sonja put the rest back on the shelves where they belonged. It was well past dinner by the time Zell had checked out, and his stomach was rumbling loudly as he headed out the door.

“Come find me when you finish those!” Marnie called out as he left. “I’ll help you pick out the next ones to read!”

 

Between classes, homework, and training, it was almost two weeks before Zell finished his first stack of books, and then another three days before he made it back to the library. He stepped inside slowly, not certain whether Marnie was working that day and not sure if he was shameless enough to turn right around and leave if it turned out she wasn’t. He didn’t need to worry though, because she was organizing the magazine rack, and waved happily when he walked in. As he felt a giddy smile fill up his face, he wished he could be just a little bit less of an open book. He was lucky that at least his crush was the type who liked to read. But he could do without the smirk the dude running the check-out today was giving him as he dropped his books in the return slot. 

Marnie led him over to a cart where she’d already assembled a few more books she thought he’d like to read next, and then helped him search out a few more on specific topics he wanted to look into, like the development of Timber’s train system, and a biography of Vinzer Deling. Zell wasn’t entirely certain he needed all of the information in some of the books he and Marnie had picked out, but at the end of the day, he just liked to know things.

Marnie giggled when he said so out loud. “Maybe you should look into working here at the library,” she said, smiling up at him. She was one of the few girls in the whole school who wasn’t as tall as an Amazon and thus towered over him. It was just one more little detail that made him convinced that she was perfect. "You’ve probably read as many of the books here as any of the other librarians. I think you’d be good at it!”

Zell flushed at the compliment, and the thought that Marnie might want to spend all day here, with him. “Nah, I already get kicked out half the time for being too loud and making a mess of things! The faculty would never let me be a librarian! I yell too much!” He followed Marnie over to a table tucked away in the far corner where they could talk with as much privacy as the library—and Zell’s volume—would allow. “I’d probably get fired for starting a fight with someone! Can you imagine?” He laughed as he plopped down into a chair and propped up his head in his elbow on the table, both to get a better look at Marnie and to keep himself from drumming his fingers on the tabletop. As it was, he still drummed his other hand on his leg, but that wasn’t as obvious or as loud. Marnie sat down next to him like a proper librarian, back straight, knees together—though that might also be because of her skirt—eyes focused forward. Outside of the library, she was a gunner, and when her face was serious, she looked it. Zell felt like she could spot him from a mile away.

“I don’t think you’re too loud. I think you’re really smart, and dedicated, and-and—” She paused, flustered, realizing what she was saying only after it came out of her mouth. Zell blinked at her, shocked. He thought he was the only one who did that. A moment later she steeled herself, and though her face was a bit red, she voice didn’t waver when she spoke. “And I think the library feels a lot more lively with you around. You make it fun!” She smiled shyly at him. “Sorry, I hope I’m not being weird. But it’s true.”

“N-no!” Zell jumped out of his seat, face hot, fighting the urge to wave his arms wildly in the air. “You’re not weird at all! I really like hanging out here together! It makes me really happy!” Zell clamped his mouth shut when he realized the entire library could probably hear him, were probably snickering behind the racks right now. He really wished he could throw a few jabs right now without looking ridiculous or getting kicked out. He felt wound up. He needed to move.

Marnie opened her mouth to speak, but then noticed the clock on the back wall of the library. “Oh! Zell! You’re late for class!”

Zell spun on one heel and looked for himself. “Shit! Not again!” Marnie scooped up the books he wanted to take home and hustled over to check them out. Zell jogged in place waiting for her to finish. As she handed him the last book, his fingers brushed hers and he caught her eyes, surprised for a moment. He stopped bouncing in place, tucked the book under his arm and looked away, rubbing his hand on his pants. “Say, Marnie, um…” He paused, searching for words.

“Yeah Zell?”

Zell took a deep breath and looked up at Marnie’s face instead of the carpet. “I have a bunch of my grandfather’s old rifles back in my room in Balamb. Would you like to come see them sometime?” He held his breath as he waited for an answer. He wasn’t sure if he’d just asked her out or not. He wasn’t sure if asking a girl to see old guns in a case in his ma’s house could even qualify as asking out. He wasn’t sure time was even moving forward anymore.

Marnie burst into a radiant smile that made Zell take a step backwards. “I have the day off work tomorrow! Is that okay?” He could hardly believe his ears.

“I’ll meet you at the front gate after class then! See you tomorrow!” He was so happy he didn’t even bother hearing the faculty yelling at him for sprinting through the halls to class, or anything Instructor Trepe had to say. He whooped and jumped like a maniac and did hand springs down the road back to Balamb.

He was going to be a SeeD, he was going to make his grandfather proud, and tomorrow was going to be the best day of his _life_.


End file.
